Ashneer Grover Inspirational Story
Ashneer Grover is the former co-founder & Managing Director of BharatPe, a mobile payments company valued at $2.85 billion. He is an excellent example of how to be successful in India’s fintech startup ecosystem. He has successfully raised capital, built a great team, and created a valuable product. BharatPe is currently one of the most promising startups in India and is quickly growing in popularity.
Though Ashneer had a great educational and career background, he faced multiple challenges. This article discusses his early life and success story.
Early Life and Education
Born on June 14, 1982, in a middle-class family in Delhi, Ashneer was very intellectual, which led him to IIT Delhi and later IIM Ahmedabad. When Ashneer pursued his B.Tech from IIT Delhi for the student exchange program, he was selected for the Institut National des Sciences Appliquées de Lyon, commonly known as INSA Lyon, France. It’s a premier and one of the largest engineering colleges in Europe. In 2002, he went to INSA Lyon to continue his studies. After graduating from IIT, he did his MBA in Finance from IIM Ahmedabad in 2006.
Initial Career
After completing his Master’s, Ashneer joined Kotak Investment Banking in 2006 and worked there for seven years as the Vice President. During his tenure, he made ten deals with USD 3 billion of transactional value. He later joined American Express (AmEx), a global financial services company. He was there from 2013 to 2015 as Director of Corporate Development, and his major role was covering payments and fintech for the company in India. He led a Series B investment in MobiKwik, an eCommerce payment systems and digital wallet company.
After leaving AmEx in 2015, Ashneer joined Grofers, now named Blinkit. He joined the startup as the Chief Financial Officer and built the company from scratch as a core team member, along with Albinder and Saurabh, founders of Grofers. Here, he raised USD 170 million for the startup from Softbank, Tiger, Sequoia, and Yuri Milner.
Later in 2017, PC Jewellers Ltd appointed Ashneer Grover as the Head of New Business. He led digital transformation and strategy at the second-largest jewelry retailer in India. He also enabled PayTM, PhonePe, Pine Labs, Magic Pin, and QwikCilver and consolidated e-comm operations under a single brand PCJ. He set the company up for the next phase of consumer experience-driven growth and diversification into adjacent businesses. He worked with PCJ for exactly one year, and in 2018 only, he founded his own company, BharatPe, with his co-founder Shashvat Nakrani.